OUR 115th Year
April 29, 2022
SEASIDESIGNAL.COM
$1.00
City passes
overnight
camping
ordinance
City could clear camp at
10th and Necanicum
By R.J. MARX
Seaside Signal
Joshua Heineman
Tillamook Rock Lighthouse is situated 1.2 miles from the Prom.
FIVE VIEWS OF SEASIDE
HISTORY ON THE PROM
New interpretative signs
along famed walkway
By R.J. MARX
Seaside Signal
F
ive new interpretative signs
along the Prom off er a glimpse
into Seaside’s history.
City engineer L.C. Rogers
designed and J.H. Tillman con-
structed what would become 8,000
feet of seawall stretching 1.5 miles
and built at a cost of $150,000. The
Promenade, fondly called the Prom,
was dedicated in a well-attended cer-
emony on Aug. 7, 1921. It is the only
concrete boardwalk along the ocean-
front in the Pacifi c Northwest.
Since that time it has been the des-
tination for countless visitors.
In 2021, the city celebrated its
100th anniversary with fanfare and a
day of festivities.
The sign project is the culmina-
tion of a grant proposal the Seaside
Visitors Bureau submitted to and was
awarded by Travel Oregon in 2021
in connection with Prom Centennial
eff orts, according to Joshua Heine-
man, director of tourism marketing
for the Seaside Visitors Bureau.
The city received $14,000 for
design, construction and fabrication
of the interpretive signs. The total
cost for this project end-to-end was
about $15,500, with the balance cov-
ered by the city advertising budget.
“The subject matter for each sign
simply came from the themes and
questions that would occupy my
mind while walking the Prom during
the pandemic,” Heineman said, part-
nering with the Seaside Museum &
A new ordinance designed to get
homeless campers off the street and
establish an overnight parking program
was approved by the City Council on
Monday night.
The City Council voted 5 to 2 to enact
rules designed to close a homeless RV
camp on 10th Avenue and Necanicum
Drive and present alternatives for over-
night shelter.
Tom and Roxanne Veazey, who live
near 10th and Necanicum, see this as
the fi rst step toward
clearing the camp.
“It’s a start,”
MORE
Roxanne
Veazey
INSIDE
said. “In the long
Necanicum
run, what they did
RVs, campers
in putting all those
receive
people in the Neca-
notice • A3
nicum lot didn’t do
any service to those
people. They’re not
going to walk over into the bathroom to
use the restroom, they’re going to use
the bushes. Then they’re going to take
whatever comes out of their sewage and
they’re going to put it in the trash.”
The ordinance is intended to protect
the safety of residents and regulate the use
of public and private property by estab-
lishing time, place and manner guidelines
for homeless camping. It puts in place a
permit program for temporary overnight
camping on both residential and non-
residential properties. Vehicles, includ-
ing vans or motor homes, would need to
be registered in compliance with vehicle
insurance responsibilities.
Without locations for people to go,
“then basically the public streets are fair
game,” Police Chief Dave Ham said.
“The fact is that if we don’t have loca-
tions to identify for somebody to go with
See Signs, Page A6
See Ordinance, Page A3
Gearhart
adopts parks
master plan
School district renews
focus on Broadway Field
By R.J. MARX
Seaside Signal
By KATHERINE LACAZE
Seaside Signal
A multiyear process came with
approval of a new parks master plan
for Gearhart. The City Council unani-
mously adopted Ordinance 932 in a fi rst
reading at a special meeting last Tues-
day. The new rules amend the city’s
comprehensive plan, zoning and sub-
division ordinances to implement the
plan.
The parks master plan solidifi es
Gearhart’s commitment to open space,
recreation and outdoor activities now
and into the future, Mayor Paulina
Cockrum said.
This is the fi rst parks plan for
Gearhart.
“The comprehensive plan calls for a
parks master plan and the City Council
has sought to create that plan for about
10 years,” she said.
The parks plan, designed to look two
decades into the future, was developed
after the state awarded the city $15,000
grant funds for the project, part of the
2019 local government grant program
from the Oregon Parks and Recreation
Department.
The plan became a priority after the
city enacted short-term rental regula-
tions and a new safety complex, Cock-
rum said.
See Parks, Page A6
After a survey and geological
testing, the Seaside School Dis-
trict Board is moving away from
Wahanna Field as the potential
location for a new softball com-
plex and instead focusing on
Broadway Field.
“Wahanna Field doesn’t pro-
vide a good development loca-
tion for this facility,” consultant
Brian Hardebeck, of Day CPM
Services, told the school board
during a meeting last week.
The new or upgraded facil-
ity must meet requirements out-
lined in a resolution with the
U.S. Department of Education’s
Offi ce for Civil Rights to provide
more equity between girls and
boys sports facilities. The school
district has until June 2023 to
complete the project.
In February, the school board
voted to focus on Wahanna as the
top candidate for the new facility,
while not ruling out three other
viable options. This sparked fur-
ther investigation into the site,
which included a regular survey,
geologic testing and a wetlands
delineation study.
“We were a little disappointed
in the results we received, pri-
marily from the geologic test-
ing,” Hardebeck said. “Findings
there were not conducive to rec-
ommendation of further devel-
opment on that property.”
The soil doesn’t have enough
lateral resistivity to handle foun-
dation loading for construction,
with a rock layer that wouldn’t
The school district is directing its attention
to softball upgrades at Broadway Field.
R.J. Marx
See Field, Page A3
Pot revenue
could help some
off set fi rehouse
bond tax hike
By R.J. MARX
Seaside Signal
A Gearhart city councilor has suggested
using money from the city’s cannabis
taxes to help low-and-moderate income
residents absorb higher property taxes if a
$14.5 million bond measure for a new fi re-
house is approved in the May election.
“In my conversations with people out in
the community canvassing and at the fi re
station, open houses and mayor’s coff ees,
quite a few people asked me about what
are you guys doing for the people who
can’t aff ord a tax increase?” City Coun-
cilor Brent Warren said at a special meet-
ing of the City Council last week. “This
program is designed to those people who
will really struggle with a tax increase. I
can guarantee you there are low-and-mod-
erate income people living in Gearhart.”
With a second cannabis shop recently
opened on U.S. Highway 101, city staff
expects tax revenue to increase. The city
could set aside $30,000 of the tax revenue
for a program that could help residents
earning up to 80% of area median income
through a subsidy.
“If we run out of funds, we can either
be allocated additional funds or terminate
the program,” Warren said. “This program
is designed for those people who will
really struggle with a tax increase.”
City councilors were reluctant to take
on the tax break before the May 17 vote on
the bond measure.
See Tax break, Page A6